Pet Food Production and Ingredient Analysis - Decision Innovation Solutions (Case Study Interview)

The pet food manufacturing industry is an increasingly important partner in the agricultural
industry. The production of animal and plant-based protein and energy sources for use in pet
food is tremendously diverse, providing nearly countless opportunities for creating recipes for
the nation’s pets. This research has sought to quantify the influence, from a volume and value
standpoint, of the pet food manufacturing industry on the broader agriculture community.
Consider the following findings from sales in 2018:
• Farmers and farm-product processors sell $6.9 billion worth of products to pet food
manufacturers every year that are used as ingredients.
• Sales made by farmers and processors of farm products to pet food manufacturers
stimulates further upstream economic activity, leading to the purchase of $5.3 billion of
materials and services from farm suppliers providing necessary inputs such as seed,
fertilizer, fuel, labor, machinery and repairs to produce high quality products that are
used as pet food ingredients.
• In addition, farm suppliers buy $4.1 billion in materials and services such as fuel,
fertilizer, equipment and labor that they in turn sell to suppliers of farmers.
• The data analyzed indicates that 2018 U.S. retail dog and cat food sales were estimated
to be $30.3 billion from 9.8 million tons of product sales.
• Among all pet food products, the lead product was dry dog food by both volume and
value, with 5.6 million tons (57% of total) and $11.2 billion dollars (37% of total).
• Pet foods use a wide variety of ingredients. The “reverse engineering” of the pet food
ingredients from the retail product labels identified 542 standardized food ingredients
used in dog and cat foods. These ingredients were further categorized into 353 similar
or combined ingredient classifications for which quantities and prices were determined.
• There are 164 ingredients shared by both cat and dog foods.
• There were 8.65 million tons of food ingredients used in U.S. dog and cat food
manufacturing with an ingredient value of $6.9 billion1
.
o There were 4.0 million tons of farm and farm-product processor ingredients
valued at $1.4 billion.
o There are more than 3.8 million tons of animal-based products with a value of
$4.6 billion used in dog and cat foods.
▪ There were 1.83 million tons of meat and poultry products valued at $3.1
billion.
▪ Rendered protein meals contributed 1.5 million tons with a value of $563
million.
1
See Appendix D for additional information regarding comparison to total reported volumes.
Pet Food Production and Ingredient Analysis January 2020
Page 8
▪ There were 289,037 tons of animal and poultry fats with a value of $153
million.
▪ Broth ingredients account for 166,851 tons with a value of $834 million.
o Fishery ingredients contributed 198,671 tons with a value of $893 million.
o Water and minerals contributed 571,164 tons with a value of $13.7 million.
• By weight, whole grains (1,869,087 tons) are the most used ingredients in dog and cat
foods. This is followed by chicken (854,988 tons), meat and bone meal (635,652 tons),
corn gluten meal (476,599 tons) and soybean meal (437,251 tons).
• By value, beef ($1.22 billion), lamb ($691 million), chicken ($650 million), salmon ($430
million) and chicken broth ($353 million) are the top five ingredients.
• Among all the 542 standardized food ingredients, 280 of them were aggregated into
nutrient groups such as animal protein, animal fat, plant protein, plant carbohydrate,
fruit and vegetable crop ingredients, etc. Animal protein ingredients comprised a
majority of the total number of ingredients, followed by fruit and vegetable crop
ingredients such as apples, blueberries, peas, spinach, etc.
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